In a roller-coaster ride in 2024, the Nikkei exceeded a record that had stood since 1989 during Japan's bubble economy.

The Nikkei 225 surged 2.2% to 42,718.172 at the bell, the highest close ever. It touched 42,999.71 earlier in the session, exceeding the previous intraday high of 42,426.77 set on July 11, 2024.

Tokyo's broader Topix (.TOPX), opens new tab gauge has been setting successive record highs since July 24 and also scored a new all-time high on Tuesday, rising 1.4% to close at 3,066.37.

The U.S. Standard & Poor's 500 (.SPX), opens new tab and MSCI's broadest gauge of global equities (.MIWD00000PUS), opens new tab have been charting new peaks since June.

SoftBank Group soared 6.9% to 14,825 yen, a historic high. The stock has catapulted more than 25% in the past five days and got an added boost after Reuters reported that SoftBank was selecting banks for a U.S. listing of its payments app operator PayPay.